Impossible mortgages - Time to help those caught in loan trap

IT is good that the debate about families being crushed by unsustainable mortgages is gathering a new urgency.

It seems to be moving towards a point where possibility, humanity and social obligation take precedence over the bleatings of bankers, developers and politicians who conspired to corral young families who had no option but to sign on the dotted line to put an impossibly expensive roof over their heads.

Once again it fell to UCD professor of economics Morgan Kelly to cut to the chase, and last week he suggested that a figure between €5 billion and €6bn would go a long way towards funding a debt forgiveness scheme for the tens of thousands of people who can’t meet mortgage repayments on their home.